Rhythm of War (The Stormlight Archive 4)

“Great. I’m glad we could chat so I could persuade you to be more stubborn. I see that your thoughts and feelings are evolving on this topic—and because you’re you, they’re going the absolute wrong direction.”

Lirin sighed. He stood and grabbed the stack of bandages, then turned to leave their little draped-off chamber.

Storm it, she wasn’t done with him yet. Hesina rose, surprised at the depth of her frustration. “Don’t you leave,” she snapped, causing him to stop by the drapes.

“Hesina,” he said, sounding tired. “What do you want from me?”

She stalked over to him, pointing. “I left everything for you, Lirin. Do you know why?”

“Because you believed in me?”

“Because I loved you. And I still love you.”

“Love can’t change the realities of our situation.”

“No, but it can change people.” She seized his hand, less a comforting gesture and more a demand that he remain there with her, so they could face this together. “I know how stressed you feel. I feel it too—feel like I’m going to get crushed by it. But I’m not going to let you continue to pretend Kaladin isn’t your son.”

“The son I raised would never have committed murder in my surgery room.”

“Your son is a soldier, Lirin. A soldier who inherited his father’s determination, skill, and compassion. You tell me honestly. Who would you rather have out there fighting? Some crazed killer who enjoys it, or the boy you trained to care?”

He hesitated, then opened his mouth.

“Before you say you don’t want anyone fighting,” Hesina interrupted, “know that I’ll recognize that as a lie. We both know you’ve admitted that people need to fight sometimes. You simply don’t want it to be your son, despite the fact that he’s probably the best person we could have chosen.”

“You obviously know the responses you want from me,” Lirin said. “So why should I bother speaking?”

Hesina groaned, tipping her head back. “You can be so storming frustrating.”

In return, he squeezed her hand gently. “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice softer. “I’ll try to listen better, Hesina. I promise.”

“Don’t just listen better,” she said, pulling him out of the draped-off section and waving toward the larger room. “See better. Look. What do you see?”

The place was busy with humans who wanted to care for the Radiants. Hesina had instituted a rotation so that everyone got a chance. Beneath the gaze of two watching stormform Regals, people of all ethnicities—and wearing all kinds of clothing—moved among the comatose Radiants. Administering water, changing sheets, brushing hair.

Hesina and Lirin used a more carefully cultivated group—mostly ardents—to handle delicate matters like bathing the patients, but today’s caregivers were common inhabitants of the tower. Darkeyes made up the majority of these, but each and every one wore a shash glyph like Kaladin’s painted on their forehead.

“What do you see?” Hesina whispered again to Lirin.

“Honestly?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“I see fools,” he said, “refusing to accept the truth. Resisting, when they’ll just get crushed.”

She heard the words he left off: Like I was.

She towed him by his arm to one side of the room, where a man with only one arm sat on a stool, painting the glyph on a young girl’s head. She ran off to her duty as Lirin and Hesina arrived. The man stood respectfully. Bearded, wearing a buttoned shirt and trousers, he had three moles on his cheek. He nodded to Hesina and Lirin. Almost a bow. As far as he could go without provoking a reaction from the watching Fused, who didn’t like such signs of respect shown to other humans.

“I know you,” Lirin said, narrowing his eyes at the man. “You’re one of the refugees who came to Hearthstone.”

“I’m Noril, sir,” the man said. “You sent me to the ardents, on suicide watch. Thank you for trying to help.”

“Well,” Lirin said, “you seem to be doing better.”

“Depends on the day, sir,” Noril said. “But I’d say I’m better than I was when you met me.”

Lirin glanced at Hesina, who squeezed his hand and gestured her chin toward Noril’s forehead and the glyph.

“Why do you wear that glyph?” Lirin asked.

“To honor Stormblessed, who still fights.” Noril nodded, as if to himself. “I’ll be ready when he calls for me, sir.”

“Don’t you see the irony in that?” Lirin asked. “It was fighting in your homeland that made you flee, and therefore get into all the trouble you’ve faced. Fighting lost you everything. If people would stop with this nonsense, I would have to see far fewer men with battle shock like yours.”

Noril settled down on his stool and used his hand to stir his cup of black paint, which he placed between his knees. “Suppose you’re right, sir. Can’t argue with a surgeon about the nonsense we do. But sir, do you know why I get up each day?”

Lirin shook his head.

“It’s hard sometimes,” Noril said, stirring. “Coming awake means leaving the nothingness, you know? Remembering the pain. But then I think, ‘Well, he gets up.’”

“You mean Kaladin?” Lirin asked.

“Yes, sir,” Noril said. “He’s got the emptiness, bad as I do. I can see it in him. We all can. But he gets up anyway. We’re trapped in here, and we all want to do something to help. We can’t, but somehow he can.

“And you know, I’ve listened to ardents talk. I’ve been poked and prodded. I’ve been stuck in the dark. None of that worked as well as knowing this one thing, sir. He still gets up. He still fights. So I figure … I figure I can too.”

Hesina squeezed Lirin’s hand again, pulling him away as she thanked Noril with a smile.

“You want me to acknowledge,” Lirin whispered, “that what Kaladin’s doing is helping that man, while my surgeon’s treatments could have done nothing.”

“You said you’d listen,” she said. “You asked what I want of you? I want you to talk to them, Lirin. The people in this room. Don’t challenge them. Don’t argue with them. Simply ask them why they wear that glyph. And see them, Lirin. Please.”

She left him standing there and returned to her maps. Trusting in him, and the man she knew he was.

Adin was going to be a Windrunner someday.

He had it all figured out. Yes, he was just a potter’s son, and spent his days learning how to turn crem into plates. But the highmarshal himself had once been a darkeyed boy from an unknown village. The spren didn’t just pick kings and queens. They watched everyone, looking for warriors.

So, as he followed his father through the halls of Urithiru, Adin found opportunities to glare at the invaders. Many might have said that at thirteen, he was too young to become a Radiant. But he knew for a fact there was a girl who had been chosen when she was younger than him. He had seen her leaving food out for old Gavam, the widow who sometimes forgot to collect her rations.

You had to be brave, even when you thought nobody was watching. That was what the spren wanted. They didn’t care how old you were, if your eyes were dark, or if the bowls you made were lopsided. They wanted you to be brave.